One paragraph from Means to Message: A Treatise on Truth by Father Stanley Jaki.
No logical escape hatch is offered from man’s ethical predicament by specious rhetoric. It is hardly logical to deprive all but one, the Seventh, of the Ten Commandments from a strictly ethical content. The illogicality rests with the cohesion among those Commandments. Thus for, instance, it is hardly possible to sin against the Seventh. which forbids thefts, without shortchanging truth, which is forbidden by the Eighth. Also, thefts begin with coveting, which is forbidden by the Ninth and Tenth. Since the Ninth forbids the coveting of one’s neighbor’s wife (or secretary or babysitter) the step to the Sixth should seem a very short one indeed. Yet the Sixth is no longer taken for even a mere counsel, although the brazen flouting of it now threatens the biological survival of modern affluent society. The latter now emancipates children from parental authority, the gist of the Fourth, which bases the duty of obedience on existential dependence. Clearly, then, it is atavistic in this society to refer to the thrust of the first three Commandments, which refer to a reality infinitely above any societal factor.
I like Fr. Jaki’s work. However, he is a bit of a crank. Also, his books require the reader to know a great deal of science, philosophy, history and theology. I think this limits his appeal to a narrow audience. He needs some kind of collaborator to make his work more accessible to the general public.
You’re right, Charles, Jaki isn’t for everyone. The philosophy in Means to Message is somewhat over my head and much of the detailed commentary on science is way, way over my head. This book was published in 1999 and is now out of print. A pity, because Jaki has a lot to offer. He publishes his most “cranky” and polemical work with Real View Books. Means to Message was published by a mainstream publisher. I wish he’d get picked up by Ignatius Press but I’ve been told they find his work too polemical.